


have the stars blotted out in a brilliant Morse code

by sagansjagger



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Adrien Agreste/Marinette Dupain-Cheng Fluff, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Humor, Identity Reveal, Morse Code, Oblivious Marinette Dupain-Cheng
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:01:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28181310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sagansjagger/pseuds/sagansjagger
Summary: Marinette doesn't know what to think of the boy shining a flashlight into her window every night. At first, she's annoyed.Then Tikki tells her he's trying to send her a message: dit, dit, dit, dah, dah, dah, dit, dit, dit-or S.O.S.As Marinette develops her skills in the technical, outdated language of Morse code in order to communicate with this lonely, mystery boy, their friendship blossoms into something more...
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 61
Kudos: 263





	have the stars blotted out in a brilliant Morse code

**Author's Note:**

  * For [InkyCoffee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/InkyCoffee/gifts).



> This fic was born from a discussion in the writing chat of the Miraculous Fanworks' Discord server (link below). Lou, also known as InkyCoffee, came up with the brilliant idea to have Adrien and Marinette meet while he was still homeschooled via flashlight Morse code.
> 
> I just had to write it.
> 
> Thanks, Lou!

“Ugh,” Marinette said, squinting in the darkness at the bright light flickering in her window. That attractive blond boy from across the street--not that she _wanted_ to see his blurry form walking around shirtless in his room, she just had a decently solid view from her balcony--was clearly shining his flashlight into her space again.

It was always the same pattern, too. Long, long, long, short, short, short, long, long, long. She huffed at him, folding her arms. “Tikki, he’s at it again.”

“Marinette,” Tikki said, cocking her red, bulbous head. “I think he’s trying to send you a message.”

Marinette blinked, smoothing her bangs off her forehead. “A message? How?”

“Have you ever heard of Morse code?”

“I think so?” Marinette said, shielding her eyes from the light. The flashlight had woken her up, and she was beginning to get truly annoyed. “It’s like dah dah dah, right?”

Tikki smiled gently. Marinette knew she was about to get lectured or told something really sad. “Morse code is the sort of thing a boy would learn if he spent a lot of time alone in his room.”

Marinette’s stomach plummeted through the floor. Guilt gnawed at her like a starved dog. She pursed her lips and furrowed her brow, blinking at the light. “What is he trying to say?”

"Short, short, short, long, long, long, short, short, short?” Tikki summed up, and Marinette nodded. “That’s S.O.S.”

Marinette started. “He needs help?” The thought of someone needing her help galvanized her muscles into action, darting over to her hope chest. She dug through it until she found the brightest light she owned.

Pulling her phone out of her purse, she climbed onto her balcony from her bed, Tikki trailing behind. “Okay, so, if he’s saying S.O.S., what do I say?”

Tikki chuckled. “You can say ‘Are you okay?’”

Marinette bit her lip. “How about just ‘okay?’ I don’t know if I’m going to be able to send him something long.” She tucked the flashlight under her arm and looked up a Morse code translator online. “So for the dashes, I let the light shine for a while, right?”

“Yes,” Tikki said, alighting on Marinette’s shoulder. “That’s right. I’m proud of you for answering him, Marinette.”

Marinette smiled. “I haven’t answered him yet.”

She typed in the word “OKAY?” into the translator and came away with --- -.- .- -.-- ..--.., instructions that she thought she could handle. Holding her phone in one hand, she lifted her flashlight and began sending her message out into the dark.

There was a pause from him as she flashed her light, trying to keep the dahs three seconds and the dits one. As soon as she was finished, she was blinded by a rapid flashing of his light. He typed out a long message for her, one she could have no hope of following.

She looked up “SLOWLY” and carefully sent that message to him.

He started sending one letter at a time, allowing Marinette to look up what they said.

“F, R, I, E, N, D, question mark,” Marinette spelled out, and despite herself she smiled broadly. “A, R, E, Y, O, U, T, H, E, R, E, question mark.”

“Y,” she flashed, “E, S.”

“TY,” he said, clearly trying to go as slowly as she needed. _Cute and considerate,_ Marinette thought.

“YW,” Marinette said, wondering what else she could say to a lonely boy in the middle of the night.

“--. .- -- . ..--..,” he typed out, and Marinette blinked. “He wants to play a game?”

Tikki, having nuzzled into Marinette’s neck, hovered in front of her, blinking blearily. She shrugged. “Do you want to play with him?”

Marinette rubbed her forehead. “Depends on the game.”

“WHAT?” she sent to him, eagerly awaiting his response.

“ASSOCIATION,” he sent back, a message that took Marinette a little while to understand. Once she got it, she beamed.

“I assume it’s my turn first,” Marinette said to Tikki, curling up on her balcony’s chair. She could still see the mystery boy’s messages from her chair. Now if she only had a blanket…

She thought for a little bit about the word she wanted to send, but it was looking at the sleepy Tikki that gave her the thought. “LADYBUG.”

“INCREDIBLE.”

Heat crawled into Marinette’s cheeks. According to the rules of the word association game, she had to send the first word that came to mind, so she did. “CHAT NOIR.”

Apparently, the blond kid didn’t like that. “DORK.”

Marinette frowned. “I’m not sure I like where this game is going, Tikki.”

She decided on an innocuous message. “FRIENDS.”

“ONE.”

Marinette’s eyes tightened. She chewed on the inside of her cheek as she tried to think of what to say. _Am I his only friend? For real?_

“SORRY,” she sent, not knowing what, exactly, she was supposed to say to that.

“DON’T BE ;),” he sent back, and Marinette’s jaw dropped.

“Tikki!” Marinette said, nudging the kwami awake from her position on Marinette’s knee. “He sent me a winking emoji! In Morse code!”

Tikki stretched, yawning. “Is that a bad thing, Marinette?”

“Well, uh,” Marinette stammered. Now that her kwami had questioned her directly, she couldn’t think of why a winking emoji was necessarily awful. “No, I guess not. But is he flirting with me?”

“I doubt it,” Tikki said, shaking her head. She yawned again, arching her tiny back. “He just met you. He’s probably trying to put your mind at ease. How was the game?”

“It ended up really sad.”

“Make it happy?”

Marinette pressed her index fingers together, her flashlight in her lap. “How?”

“Start over,” Tikki said, curling up on Marinette’s thigh. “And pick something he can’t make sad.”

Marinette considered that. “ASSOCIATION,” she flashed. “CHICKEN.”

“EGG.”

Marinette laughed. “Apparently the chicken does come first.”

Tikki mumbled a nonsense word, leaving Marinette to the game.

“YOLK,” Marinette flashed.

“PUN.”

Marinette blinked. Then she burst into giggles. “Did he just make a pun out of the word joke?” She looked up the next word on her phone. “GROAN.”

There was no pause at all. “HEIGHT.”

Marinette wondered if he was laughing as hard as she was. “TERRIBLE.”

“PERFORATED.”

“Not ‘tearable’!” Marinette was cackling so hard, she felt tears sting her eyes. Tikki flew off of her thigh with a disgruntled glare and phased through Marinette’s skylight back into her room.

“Perforated,” Marinette repeated to herself. “Perforated. He did not make this easy on me.”

Eventually, she decided on the truth: “GIGGLING RN.”

“TY,” he sent back.

After that night, Marinette threw herself into learning Morse code. She sent messages out into the dark every night, playing games with the sad, lonely, blond boy from across the street. She loved the alphabet game, where they’d come up with words starting with the last letter of the previous word. Whomever couldn’t come up with the next word lost.

As Marinette’s skills with the technical, outdated language improved, the two friends moved on to more taxing games, like 20 questions and two truths and a lie. The messages were sometimes garbled, but Marinette--and she presumed the boy--had a good laugh about them each time.

After weeks of their secret messages, he sent something that shocked her. “ILY FRIEND.”

Marinette’s heart fluttered in her chest as she responded. “ILY 2.”

***

***

“And she told me she loved me, too!” Chat gushed, balancing on a girder at the top of the Eiffel Tower. Ladybug was amused at how graceful he was. He was never in danger of falling even though he walked dangerously close to the edge, one foot in front of the other, boots firmly straddling the line between metal and air. “She’s the greatest, Bug, I’m telling you!”

“You tell me this every time we meet.” Ladybug chuckled, her legs dangling off the edge of the tower from her seated position. “And you haven’t even met this mystery girl?”

Chat wilted. “No, we’ve just sent messages.”

“Can you not track her down?”

Chat shrugged, twiddling his thumbs. “I’m not bold enough for that. What if she doesn’t like me when she meets me in the flesh? What if I’m not good enough for her? What if--”

“--the sky turns to fire and your nose falls off?” Ladybug stood, brushing her hands off. “Trust me, Chat, you’re good enough for her. You should be worrying if she’s good enough for you.”

“No way.” Chat held up his hands. “She’s the best. She’s clever and kind and compassionate and she never lets me spend my nights alone anymore.”

Ladybug’s gaze softened. “She sounds like a great friend to have, Chat. I’m glad for you.”

“Thanks, Bug,” Chat murmured, kicking at an imaginary rock. “So, patrol?”

“Patrol.”

***

It wasn’t until Marinette went to school one day that she realized how enmeshed Morse code had become in her life.

Adrien Agreste was the new student in class, sitting in front of her. She adored the back of his head. She adored his collar, his hair, and that sliver of neck she could see above his shirt. Everything about the back of his head was beautiful to her.

Then he started tapping his pencil. Short, short, pause, short, long, long, long, long, short, pause, long, long…

“I’M SO BORED,” his pencil said.

Before she could even think, Marinette tapped out, “ME TOO.”

Adrien whipped his head and shoulders around to look at her. He reached up with his pencil and tapped on her desk: “FRIEND? ARE YOU THERE?”

Marinette’s smile was a small, soft thing that quickly grew into a blinding intensity. Her Morse code friend was Adrien Agreste? _Adrien Agreste_ was her Morse code friend?

“Y,” she tapped out. “E, S.”

“Adrien,” Miss Bustier said, turning his attention back to her. “Please turn around.”

“Yes, Miss Bustier,” Adrien said immediately, whipping around to sit back in his seat. Marinette admired the pink flush that crawled up the back of his neck and onto his cheeks, looking enticing enough to kiss. She longed to press her lips to every inch of his face, especially his perfect mouth.

And now that she knew _Adrien freaking Agreste_ was her Morse code friend, well… He was just that much more appealing. She’d longed to spend her nights with Adrien before, and once she realized she’d already been doing that, she rocketed up to cloud nine and decided to open a villa there.

She had to send him a message. “ASSOCIATION,” she tapped out. “GYRO.”

Adrien turned his head slightly so she could see his smile. “GREEK.”

“GOD.”

“JUPITER.”

Alya passed Marinette a note. Marinette ignored it. She was too focused on communicating with her secret friend. “PLANET.”

“PLUTO.”

Marinette giggled, and Adrien grinned at her sideways. “PLUTO’S NOT A PLANET.”

Adrien sighed, placing a hand on his chest. “IT IS IN MY HEART.”

Marinette snickered. “WHAT ELSE IS IN YOUR HEART?”

Adrien’s response was immediate. He straightened his shoulders and tapped out long, short, long long, pause, long, long, long, pause, short, short, long: “YOU.”

Marinette’s lips parted as heat crawled up her neck, settling in her cheeks. She felt so incredibly _soft_ , as if her mystery boy--who was clearly no longer a mystery!--had wrapped her up in a cotton blanket fresh from the dryer.

Trying to distract herself from what, exactly, he had meant, Marinette picked up Alya’s note. “M,” it read in Alya’s flowing cursive. “What are you doing to that boy?”

 _What, indeed,_ Marinette wondered, biting her lip. Did Adrien like her? Like, _like_ like her? It wasn’t like she hadn’t entertained the possibility before. She could easily see herself developing a crush on her Morse code friend, and she already had developed a crush on Adrien from him giving her his umbrella.

But did he like her?

 _We’re just good friends,_ Marinette decided, scribbling a hasty, “Nothing,” back to Alya. It was a lie; Marinette clearly had some sort of an effect on Adrien. She could make him happy… to be her friend.

Marinette made another decision: she had to have him over to her house. They’d been sending messages for months now and had never officially met. _That changes today,_ she thought, wondering why she’d never asked for his name before.

Her Morse code friend had been sitting in front of her for two weeks now, and she’d missed it. How could she have missed that?

She’d also missed how tense his shoulders had become. Marinette looked at Adrien, really looked at him. He wasn’t prone to fidgeting, but he was twirling his pencil in his hand. Sweat beaded at his temples. He kept glancing back to her, his grass-green eyes slightly wide and his lip firmly in the grip of his teeth.

 _He’s waiting on a reply,_ she realized, and she kicked herself for making him wait.

“MEET ME AFTER SCHOOL.”

***

Marinette waited on the steps of Collège Françoise Dupont, chewing on the end of her pencil. Adrien had stayed behind in the class to get some extra credit homework--not that he needed it. She knew his grades were perfect because her mystery friend had told her education was important to his family, and she’d believed him.

But now she was wondering if he was just making her wait on purpose. _Maybe he doesn’t want to meet me. What if he doesn’t like me when he meets me in the flesh? What if I’m not good enough for him? What if--_

“Marinette?” Adrien said from behind her, causing her to whirl around and release the pencil from her fist and teeth. She watched helplessly as it flew forward, striking him in the chest.

“A-Adrien! I’m so sorry!” Marinette said as he stooped over to pick up her tossed writing implement. “I didn’t mean to--are you okay?”

Adrien beamed. A world of promise was in that smile. “That was the first thing you ever said to me.”

Marinette thought back. She was pretty sure the first thing she’d said to him involved mistakenly scolding him for placing gum on her seat. But then she realized: not “are you okay?” but “OKAY?”

He was referring to the first time she’d responded to his S.O.S. message. The first time she’d made a friend she’d never met.

Adrien stood in front of her, shifting on his feet. He was still holding out her pencil for her. She’d wanted to meet her mystery friend for a long, long time now. She just didn’t expect it to be so awkward talking face to face.

 _Wait,_ she realized. _I can make this less awkward._

After retrieving the pencil and tucking it away in her purse, she took his hand in hers and started squeezing. Long, short, long, short, pause, short, long, short… “CROISSANT?”

Adrien’s eyes lit up. He grinned and squeezed back. “PLEASE.”

Marinette held his hand all the way to her house. The bell on the front door rang as she opened it, stepping through first to allow him to enter behind her, still squeezing his hand. “WELCOME.”

“TY.”

“Hello, Marinette!” her mother’s voice rang out from behind the counter. “Welcome home. Who’s this?”

Marinette gestured to him with her free hand. “This is Adrien Agreste, Maman.” Marinette’s voice felt rusty with disuse. But she didn’t need her voice to communicate. “Adrien, this is Sabine Cheng, my mother.”

“Hello,” Adrien said shyly, raising his free hand in a wave. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Cheng.”

“Oh, please,” Sabine said, her eyes glittering. “Call me Sabine. Any friend of my daughter’s is a friend of mine.”

Marinette beamed. “Maman, can Adrien and I have some croissants? We’re going to go upstairs and play some games.”

By the time Marinette finished talking, Sabine had already dished up some of the chocolate, pistachio, and pumpkin croissants into a box. “All sweet? Or some savory as well?”

Adrien looked like he was salivating. His eyes were star-bright. “Do you have cheese?”

 _He must really like cheese,_ Marinette thought, getting a whiff of camembert from him as he stepped forward. Adrien was an odd mixture of smells: delicious cologne, aromatic sweat, stinky cheese. Marinette figured she could get used to all of them.

“Of course!” Sabine said, piling more croissants on the pile. “Pepper jack and brie with cranberry.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Cheng!” Adrien said, squeezing, “KIND,” into Marinette’s hand.

“SHE IS,” Marinette squeezed back, reluctantly letting go of Adrien’s hand to take the giant box of croissants. “Thanks, Maman. We’ll be upstairs if you need us!”

Adrien trailed behind Marinette as she climbed the stairs. Her hand felt cold without his, and she wanted nothing more than to put the stupid box down and take it again.

By the time she reached her trap door, Marinette was hoping her room wasn’t messy. She’d have to delete that computer wallpaper of Adrien’s face festooned with hearts and hope he didn’t see. _I have all those pictures of him hanging up! Aaah, inviting him over was such a bad idea!_

Entering her room, Marinette set the box of croissants on the desk and popped it open. She took Adrien’s hand again. “SAVORY?”

“SWEET, TY,” he squeezed back, and plucked up one of the pumpkin croissants. He took a giant bite, almost stuffing the entire thing into his mouth, and moaned aloud.

Marinette giggled, heat blooming into her cheeks. “GROAN?”

Adrien swallowed his croissant and chuckled. “HEIGHT.”

Marinette picked up one of the pistachio croissants in her free hand and led him to sit down on her chaise. “I… suppose we can talk now.”

Adrien settled on the chaise and finished his croissant. Marinette’s first thought was that he wasn’t going to speak to her, even though she loved the sound of his voice. It made her a little sad. Then he spoke around a smile, sending her heart pounding. “Thank you for inviting me.”

“You’re welcome,” Marinette said, plucking at the flaky layers of bread in the croissant. She forced herself to look into his gorgeous, green eyes. “It’s… It’s good to finally meet you, Adrien. Again, I mean.”

“Marinette,” Adrien started, and then hesitated, as if searching for the right words. Marinette leaned forward into his space, almost falling on top of him. He didn’t lean back, so she took that as a good sign.

She wanted to be close to him. She wanted to breathe him in. She wanted…

She didn’t know what she wanted, except to be sitting next to him right at this very moment.

“Yes?” she whispered, waiting for the way his perfect, pretty lips would curve around his next words. His mouth was fascinating. He had a smear of pumpkin on the corner of his lips and Marinette wanted nothing more than to reach up and wipe it off, but she didn’t dare touch anything of him other than his hand.

“Thank you,” Adrien said, and Marinette jerked back when his eyes filled with tears. He cast his eyes into his lap and swallowed hard. “Your friendship… It means the world to me. Before I met you, I was all alone in that big house. I don’t have a very attentive… family.”

Marinette lapped up his words like a dehydrated cat. Her Morse code friend had steered the subject away from his family life every time she’d broached it. That he trusted her enough to come to her with that now… She was thrilled.

“Adrien,” she said, setting her croissant aside and taking his hand again. “I’m not very good with words. But I want to tell you that I’m honored to count you as a friend. There’s nowhere I’d rather be than talking with you.”

“ILY FRIEND,” he squeezed.

“ILY 2,” she squeezed back.

***

“I love her, Bug,” Chat said one night, his tone uncharacteristically somber.

Ladybug started. _What?_ She looked at Chat, really looked at him.

One of Chat’s legs was dangling off of the platform above Eiffel Gustav’s apartment, and he’d pulled his other knee up to his chest. He was curled in on himself, all bone and sinew, as if sheltering himself from the cold truth he’d just uttered.

“What?” Ladybug said, all her attention narrowed down to Chat’s familiar-looking lips.

“I love her,” he repeated. “I’m pretty sure she doesn’t think of me as anything but a friend. But I would die for her.”

“I hope you don’t have to,” Ladybug joked, then cursed herself. _Joking about Chat’s feelings isn’t going to endear him to you!_ She tucked her hair behind her ear. “What I mean, Chat, is… I’m sorry she doesn’t see how amazing you are yet.”

“Yet?” Chat turned his face to her, his effervescent, green eyes shining with so much trust, it just about broke her heart. “You think I have a chance?”

Ladybug settled beside him, looping an arm around his shoulders. “Of course you do.”

“But--” Chat started, but then an akuma alert blared on her phone and his baton. They both pulled away from each other and stood, checking their communication devices. “Hmm. In Montparnasse.”

“Ugh,” Ladybug said, frowning as she scrolled through the news feed. “Looks like… he’s putting people in boxes that slowly shrink?”

Chat wrinkled his nose. “Ew. Let’s take care of him quickly.”

“Agreed.”

Ladybug expected to take care of this akuma quickly. She did not expect Chat to shove her out of the way and get hit. “Chat!” she screamed as the box _popped_ into existence around him.

Just like that, Chat was gone from her field of vision. And her hearing. Spinning her yo-yo to deflect the akuma’s wand’s blasts, she shouted at the box, but she couldn’t hear Chat’s voice.

She did, however, hear a knock. Several.

Short, short, short, pause, long, short, long, short, pause, short, long…

“SCARED,” he was knocking.

Desperate, angry tears stung Ladybug’s eyes. She bounded out of the way of the akuma, determined more than ever to take him down. Leaping back to the box, she pounded out a quick message with her free hand: “IM HERE.”

“Give me your miraculous!” Penalty Boxer, the akuma, shouted. Ladybug would have rolled her eyes, but her partner was suffering and she was beyond pissed.

She ducked behind the box, which had shrunk down by a third of its original size. “Lucky Charm!” Tikki gave her… a huge bowl full of ice cream. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

Peeking around the box, she realized there was a very straightforward solution: throw the bowl at Penalty Boxer’s face.

Tucking the bowl under one arm, she launched herself forward, diving out of the way of a purple blast. She expertly weaved her way closer to Penalty Boxer, and then slammed the bowl onto his face.

Backing off, she allowed the bowl to fall, but Penalty Boxer was blinded. He shrieked as ice cream dripped off his chin and tried to wipe at his eyes. But it was too late: Ladybug had wrapped her yo-yo around his wand and jerked it out of his grip. She broke it over her knee, releasing the man from the grip of the evil butterfly.

 _Chat!_ Ladybug immediately picked up the bowl and hurled it into the air. “Miraculous Ladybug!” Her millions of tiny helpers flowed around the area, freeing people from their boxes.

She almost forgot to purify the akuma, but caught it just before she ran over to her partner. He was panting, leaning over with his hands on his knees. His face was pale and covered in sweat, and his eyes were impossibly wide. His lip trembled as he looked up at her approach.

“Chat,” Ladybug said, placing a steadying hand on his shoulder. “I’m here.”

Chat sucked a breath over his teeth. “Ladybug.” The way his voice broke, breathy and reedy, shattered Ladybug’s heart. “Sorry.” She shook her head as he continued. “I’m just a bit claws-trophobic.”

“A bit?” Ladybug smiled despite the situation. “Chat, that scared me. That scared me a lot. Don’t ever push me out of the way again.”

Chat opened his mouth as if to argue, but then appeared to think better of it. “I didn’t know you knew Morse code.”

Ladybug pulled away. “A… A friend taught me.”

Chat’s brows rose. “You learned Morse code for a friend?”

“Yeah,” Ladybug said, biting her lip. “He was lonely and sending an S.O.S. message out into the night.”

Chat gasped, and Ladybug didn’t know if it was because of what she’d said or a residual effect of the claustrophobia.

She did not expect what he did next. He took her hand, squeezing it. She was too stunned to react, so he typed out a long message: short, short, long, short, pause, short, long, short, pause, short, short…

“FRIEND?” he was saying as Ladybug began to shake, “ARE YOU THERE?”

Ladybug began to cry. She tore her hand from his, using both of hers to cover her mouth.

Chat looked miserable. He stared at his feet, tears forming in those impossibly-beautiful eyes. She’d only been working with her partner for a month, but she was amazed at how she hadn’t seen it before.

And now he was miserable, and it was her fault.

Ladybug swallowed her sobs. _Straighten up!_ she told herself, rubbing her cheeks. She stepped forward into his space and took both his hands.

“ILY ILY ILY ILY ILY,” she squeezed out as rapidly as she could, leaving a stunned chat in her wake. She glared at him fiercely, her mouth hovering inches from his.

Chat sniffled. Then he smiled one of his maddeningly-gorgeous smiles, and Ladybug’s heart leapt. “ILY 2.”

Ladybug went for it. She closed the distance, pressing a quick kiss to the corner of his mouth.

Chat gasped again, releasing one of her hands to touch his lips. His gaze softened as he cupped the back of her head. “Ladybug…”

Ladybug wanted nothing more than to stand there and kiss him senseless, but they had an akuma victim to comfort. “Let’s go help the victim, and then we can figure out what to do from here, okay?”

Chat gulped and nodded. “Okay.”

***

A week had passed since the reveal of their superhero identities, and Marinette was anxious to talk to Adrien.

He’d been uncharacteristically silent for three days. She’d been sick and missed school, and ever since the night he’d sent her a message checking in on her, he hadn’t spoken with his lights at night.

Marinette was starting to get worried. He’d missed one or two nights of talking before, but not three in a row. She sat in her balcony chair, chewing on her nails and flashing long, long, long, short, short, short, long, long, long over and over. As soon as she finished the message, she coughed into her fist and started the new one over.

It was past midnight. She was just about to give up and stomp over to his house--maybe swing into his window--when she caught a light out of the corner of her eye.

“LADYBUG,” the message flashed, and Marinette was instantly on high alert. “HELP. MY FATHER IS HAWKMOTH.”

“Tikki!” Marinette screamed, sending her into a fit of coughing. “Spots on!”

Her transformation light washed over her, and she whipped her yo-yo forward, launching herself out towards Adrien’s house. The window to his room was open when she arrived. She landed on his hardwood floor with a rubbery thumb and strode over to where he sat on his bed with his knees pulled up to his chest.

He was rocking and shaking, tears streaming freely down his face. She sat on the bed next to him and pulled him into a hug. “Adrien,” she whispered, pressing a kiss to his temple. She choked on her phlegm. “Adrien.”

He didn’t respond, simply stared ahead. Alarmed, she took his hand and squeezed it. “ILY.”

Adrien started, whipping his head to her. His eyes focused again and he squeezed back, “ILY 2.”

“L-Ladybug,” he said finally, his lower lip quivering as he panted. “My father, he’s--”

“I know, I saw your message,” Ladybug said, smoothing his hair over his face. She turned her head to cough. “You don’t have to say it.”

“Okay,” Adrien said, nodding shakily. “He takes sleeping medication and should be asleep by now. We can take the Butterfly Miraculous while he’s out.”

“Good plan.” Ladybug cupped his cheeks in her hands, heaving a sigh of relief that Adrien seemed to have recovered some of his normal heroism. “Transform and we’ll go take it.”

“Plagg,” Adrien called quietly. “Claws out.”

Ladybug had assumed that Adrien had motions for his transformation just like she did. But he didn’t go through with them this time; he simply let the green light wash over him.

Ladybug released him as he shook himself. He stood from the bed, fists clenched. “Okay, let’s do this.”

In the end, Chat and Ladybug freeing Nooroo from his master’s control was terribly anticlimactic. Ironic, too, given who Hawkmoth was.

Adrien was adopted by his chauffeur driver, whom Adrien affectionately referred to as the Gorilla. Gabriel went to jail and eventual house arrest.

And Adrien and Marinette were happy.

As she walked towards altar years later, Marinette reflected on how a lonely boy’s experiment had brought her to this point. He’d been seeking connection, and she was happy to provide once she realized what a wonderful, funny, competent person he was.

And now she was here, wearing a gown she’d designed herself, freshly-graduated from university and ready to take the next step in life. A step she was absolutely willing to take.

 _He’s so handsome,_ Marinette thought, watching her fiance’s smile grow as she approached him. She wondered what his first words to her would be as her husband.

She didn’t have to wait long to find out.

Adrien took her hand in his. “FRIEND? ARE YOU THERE?”

“IM HERE,” she squeezed back.

Adrien kissed the inside of her wrist, keeping his warm, green gaze on her. “ILY.”

And Marinette smiled. “ILY 2.”

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on tumblr at [@sing-in-me-oh-muse](https://sing-in-me-oh-muse.tumblr.com)!
> 
> \---
> 
> Are you interested in reading or writing fanfiction? Are you looking for a community of like-minded and supportive people? Then join the [Miraculous Fanworks](https://discord.gg/mlfanworks) Discord server! 
> 
> We are always welcoming new members, and would love to see you. We offer a variety of conversations, from fic discussions to writing support to fanfiction prompts. We even have monthly server-wide events and group writing projects! 
> 
> Come join today!


End file.
